Bad Friends
Claire Seeber
A terrible accident. A secret discovered. An inescapable nightmare. Who needs enemies with friends like these? The unnerving new novel from the acclaimed author of LULLABYEn route from ending a destructive love affair, TV producer Maggie Warren is involved in a freak accident. Lucky to escape with her life, Maggie's further disturbed to discover she's now front-page news. When invited to discuss her trauma on a chat-show, Maggie comes face to face with fellow survivor, the beautiful but damaged Fay Carter - fame-hungry, needy and now apparently infatuated.One by one the tentacles of Maggie's past mistakes seem to be reaching inexorably into her future. Her compromised career is catching up with her, ex-boyfriend Alex just won't take no for an answer - but worse, the secret Maggie has tried so hard to bury is coming back to haunt her.When Maggie's flat is ransacked, she refuses to believe it's a coincidence. Now Maggie's clutching onto sanity for dear life, but she's horribly aware that one final push might send her over the edge…or is that exactly what someone wants?
CLAIRE SEEBER
Bad Friends
Copyright (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
AVON
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A Paperback Original 2008
Copyright © Claire Seeber 2008
Claire Seeber asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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Source ISBN: 9781847560483
Ebook Edition © JANUARY 2009 ISBN: 9780007281886
Version: 2018-05-25
For all my parents
and
in memory of my beloved Granny.
I’m running towards you (though it might take me a while).
BAD FRIENDS
‘If love is judged by most of its effects,
it resembles hate more than friendship.’
François de La Rochefoucauld – Les Maximes
AFTER: DECEMBER (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
I am running for my life, I know that now.
The moon slips behind the clouds. Perhaps the darkness is a boon, but the shadows that fall beside me seem to mock me as I flee, as I fly down the drive from the house. Desperately my hand closes round the bunch of metal; my little finger catches on a jagged edge, I feel my flesh tear slightly, but I ignore the pain. I slide dangerously in the mud but I will not fall, will not allow it; I right myself, though my leaden legs suck me into the stony ground; they scream with every step that I should stop but I can’t, I daren’t. I push myself on, stumbling on and on, because they are nearer now … closing on me for sure …
I am off the gravel drive and tracking across the great wild lawn towards the wooden bridge; towards the pub where there is life. I have no time to look around; worse, I can’t bear to see how long I’ve got.
Running for my life. I cannot get my breath; I fight for it until it sobs up through my chest like a dead man’s rattle. I was fast once, really fast as a child, running for joy and for gold – but I am out of practice now, I haven’t run properly for years and my bad foot hampers me. Terror drives me, terror that drips down and smothers me.
If I can just reach the pub, slam myself inside, I might be safe. Saved. But God, why was I mad enough to think I was safe to come here alone?
It is too late. The car is stopping, skidding behind me, and it’s like I am fastened to the house by its beam. I swing round. I have to face my hunter; I cannot stand unseeing, so exposed. The car door opens smoothly as an oily disc of moonshine slides out from behind fingers of cloud. Everything is illuminated so perfectly and I start towards the car in relief – until that smile meets me, and I actually gasp. I reel in shock like I’ve been punched, gut-punched where it most hurts.
‘You?’ I say numbly. ‘It can’t be you.’
A small and measured step towards me. ‘But it is, Maggie.’ And that smile, it is a flat smile. A traitor’s smile. ‘Weren’t you expecting me?’
BEFORE: JUNE (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
I breathe hard onto the coach window and watch the fug slowly spread before me. Tracing the small cloud with my finger, I write my name across the middle like a schoolgirl. My name slants; a single tear tracks downwards from the M. I make a fist and vigorously rub myself out again. My hand is damp now; I wipe it dry. Cocooned in this muggy warmth, safe for the moment from the damp, dark night, I’m struggling to stay awake. Far off in the drizzle a tiny house twinkles with beguiling light, nestled into the old church beside it like a trusting child. I gaze wistfully after the enticing image, but we are truly hurtling down the motorway now, a sleek capsule slicing the M4’s black, and the house has vanished already.
I hold my breath as the teenage boy beside me bobs his head shyly, uncurls his awkward new height from beside me, scuttling with an odd spider’s gait to talk to his mates up-front. Now he’s gone there is some space here for my sadness, some room to acknowledge the pain of what I’ve just left behind. I feel utterly raw; like I’ve been flayed alive. I bite my lip against the grief. The truth is we’ve gone too far this time, I can’t see a return. We said it all; we let the floodgates down and we got truly drenched.
An abandoned can of Strongbow rolls under my feet. I let the can rattle until it annoys me, hitting my heel over and over. I retrieve it, stick it firmly into the net on the seat-back in front, fighting the urge to lick my wet fingers, drying them instead on the knobbly cloth on the seat beside me. I wish I’d had the foresight to find something to kill the ache before embarking. I wish I had some wine, my iPod, a cookery book – any means, in fact, of forgetting. I wish I wasn’t travelling alone. I wish I’d known I would be.
My eyelids droop inexorably until my head bangs against the thick, cool glass.
‘Ouch.’ I jerk up, feeling foolish, forcing myself upright again. I don’t want to sleep here, don’t want to surrender to the inevitable nightmares surrounded by these strangers. So I watch the little woman across the aisle, a mousey hobbit who mouths each word of Northanger Abbey aloud, scanning each page fervently, her pale lips oddly stiff despite their constant movement. I wish that I’d never read the book myself so that I could have that pleasure again for the first time. The couple in front lean into each other, the tops of their heads touching, their hair almost entwined as he whispers something he wants only her to hear. Right now, I think tragically, it’s unlikely I’ll ever feel any first pleasure again; that anyone will ever want to whisper anything to me again. I almost smile at my self-indulgence. Almost – but not quite.
Eventually I succumb to sleep, rocked by the lullaby of voices that murmur through the dim coach. I don’t notice the dark-haired girl as she passes by to use the poky loo, though later the girl swears blind that she saw me in my seat – she liked my hair, the girl says (God knows, it’s hard to miss). Says she knew I was a kindred spirit. But I do notice the tall man who drops his bag as he stumbles past, jolting me uncomfortably back into wakefulness. I am startled again as I glance up, befuddled. My heart stops; I think it’s Alex. My heart flames with pain; my belly corkscrews.
I won’t catch the man’s eye, although I can sense he wants to speak. I can’t bear to look at him. He might see what I’m trying so hard to hide, so I turn away again. I find my fists are clenched, nails dug deep into my palms. I twist my hair into a nervous rope, tucking it behind one shoulder. Even in my shadowy reflection I can see the red of it, the flame I can’t escape and –
I see something else, something beyond the window, out there in the dark. I hold my breath in shock.
What I see is fear. Pure and undistilled, the face I gaze into is mad with it, big eyes rolling back into the brain until they are all white; a nightmare vision that is in fact quite real. The nostrils flare in panic, the huge teeth bared in a grin of frothing terror, the mane flying in the wind. For one small second snatched in old time, the time that will soon become the time before – the safe time – I find I’m not scared. I want to stretch my hand through the window and smooth the trembling flank; soothe this rearing beast. But then my own terror crashes in around me and I feel very tiny. The horse’s great flailing hooves will surely pierce the coach’s metal side. Frantic, I press back into my seat, trying to flatten myself against the blow.
The chance to find my voice, to shout a futile warning, has already passed. The lullaby is building to a shriek. The passengers are screaming, have begun to scream as one, because the coach is tilting, tilting on its axis until it cannot right itself again, until finally it topples. It skids across the road in hideous scraping chaos, on its side now – and still the coach keeps moving. I am level with the road; blue sparks fly up from the concrete before me as if a welder were torching the ground. Then I roll, slam hard into a body so all the wind goes out of me.
I cannot see. My hands flail at the blackness. Panting with terror, I am thrown against some metallic edge. A flash of agonising pain fills my left shoulder as I crack it on what must be the ceiling. A child cries piteously. Someone’s foot grinds into my gut, a fist pummels my mouth in fear. I claw at my face as something oddly intimate drapes itself across me, a mouthful of hair that chokes and sickens me. I struggle to breathe, to let some air in. Any air. I panic that I am blind. We are still moving. Why the hell haven’t we stopped moving?
A huge whump: the central reservation crumples as the coach crashes through, on its back now. It’s slowing, and someone near me is screaming, they won’t stop screaming, on and on –
A terrible metallic crack ends the voice. The coach is jerked by force into the fast lane. My head whips forward, then snaps back again. There’s a crunch as the first van hits us head on, and folds: then the next vehicle, then the next. A hot flash up my left leg. Finally there is silence – almost silence. Just a single horn blaring into the complete darkness, then, soon after, another: a petulant electronic chorus. Closer to me, a whimpering that spreads like wildfire. We have finally stopped moving and now there is nothing. Just darkness. Just the sob of my own breath as I clasp myself and wonder: Is this death?
Contents
Copyright (#ua764892c-8a50-550b-a1e8-8ab971851164)Title Page (#u842950a4-ee22-5e63-890e-f52cd98fe4cf)Copyright (#ud6cffb08-2e45-5ae0-87df-87be04a1a43c)Epigraph (#u4fd51298-d607-5ce3-b59a-0447e46f66bc)AFTER: DECEMBER (#u2f657f37-3665-5457-9672-e8550c08e925)BEFORE: JUNE (#uffc32f85-d754-5c26-a557-bb6663319c39)Chapter One (#u2a68d934-056a-5065-90fd-eee9e46d3067)Chapter Two (#u4cfe1a04-33d1-5f4a-a63a-22ce2c3371aa)Chapter Three (#u9f8e542a-1c3b-515f-b67b-61a4f66c8c9f)Chapter Four (#udaa48911-132d-5f27-bb7d-7b72f15133ea)Chapter Five (#u9bfcd34d-1a13-504e-a63d-e7c4c5b05172)Chapter Six (#u1e9526eb-b3f1-5309-8912-058384dee512)Chapter Seven (#ud738c3f8-1cb7-59b0-bf0c-f7278336d197)Chapter Eight (#ue6d6812c-66d7-55e2-8b78-f20b98a20737)Chapter Nine (#u1c4d8777-ac13-5041-a164-0988d1102302)Chapter Ten (#ub39e007b-0c0b-52e5-a5ba-77363ea91f6d)Chapter Eleven (#u8cc447d6-1c5b-5120-8526-b42fb3b560de)Chapter Twelve (#u634947fb-1082-537a-9794-d925b3df1f40)Chapter Thirteen (#uccb2f09d-96e6-55aa-8569-5c148ddb8835)Chapter Fourteen (#u776306cc-9dd6-5ec9-8c19-93b2552ae0e9)Chapter Fifteen (#uc55b78e6-0792-5cf9-982e-faa88901dd85)Chapter Sixteen (#u8a4b2fd7-defd-53c7-aea8-f00628858df6)Chapter Seventeen (#u025412c7-ddc9-5186-8e35-783f0e46c875)Chapter Eighteen (#u8af4ae9c-fc64-5a4e-9602-e1bb3790ee1f)Chapter Nineteen (#u6e279209-137e-56ab-a198-cf35db03387f)Chapter Twenty (#u79987b10-3a40-5046-80ba-9e32d5d83d1f)Chapter Twenty-One (#ud17c0865-ac48-57c8-bfa5-ad82acf0040e)Chapter Twenty-Two (#u0c2cec2e-1ef9-5ee5-af43-45f0b95336a1)Chapter Twenty-Three (#u9b532761-0c81-59d7-9752-c030e11d1d31)Chapter Twenty-Four (#u43b32afc-ffe2-5c57-b79e-d697f3629259)Chapter Twenty-Five (#ue90a6be5-3a11-5bad-9435-b51f2721231c)Chapter Twenty-Six (#u8678b408-e896-5d0e-8b9b-118164b10499)Chapter Twenty-Seven (#ub0382a0d-81fd-5574-9f2d-7f10ef6bbe0c)Chapter Twenty-Eight (#uee2e4dcc-55ca-5564-9510-854af876de58)Chapter Twenty-Nine (#u1877d5d0-63aa-53a5-b61e-a17a5bf7aeff)Chapter Thirty (#u1ddcd82b-cf70-5c21-aff4-cc89875caf63)Chapter Thirty-One (#u83567e6b-ccdb-5615-8052-dca9ad4312f7)Chapter Thirty-Two (#u36bd05b4-e6db-533f-86b5-bbd3a79f2fbd)Chapter Thirty-Three (#u508c9f58-5f8b-56e4-8767-bf9b13c4c588)Chapter Thirty-Four (#ua8be2567-fa0f-5fd9-b5ff-7d9e67b4cafb)Chapter Thirty-Five (#u0feba18c-4807-57d2-9287-31e84957f095)Chapter Thirty-Six (#u228185f3-8878-5ece-9ca7-f9750f4c5f38)Chapter Thirty-Seven (#u568d5f3f-107d-59b9-a674-4255407de2bc)Chapter Thirty-Eight (#uf283f75e-6386-5b89-8ff4-cb483d1edd35)Chapter Thirty-Nine (#u5a38c82f-01a5-54f4-ab3a-541620ad2b46)Chapter Forty (#u24a1a3ce-5eea-546f-8ed9-b249d18a7901)Chapter Forty-One (#ue2535322-5c10-56ce-b366-3fdc3bad367d)Chapter Forty-Two (#u299f97d7-ac37-5fbd-8564-f8e42fc0af7b)Chapter Forty-Three (#uf752695c-53b0-5100-a7a3-643a103c475d)Chapter Forty-Four (#ud5967152-4a81-55bc-877d-3b3ba4c8045d)Chapter Forty-Five (#u9f22b351-723c-5b39-b1aa-93687a229e6b)Chapter Forty-Six (#ud062cf56-6836-5340-9f98-fa5ee72b022d)Chapter Forty-Seven (#u6bdba8d2-8c55-5486-856d-6f37e712f4ce)Chapter Forty-Eight (#u72ea0f66-65ba-53a0-a715-13c0a7f9640c)A Conversation With Claire Seeber (#u375d8143-5f93-5bdc-8184-2db43ced46ba)Acknowledgments (#u27a494ba-5a52-5095-85ea-ad7e305c89d2)About the Author (#u561ac789-a186-5a85-99ff-91668e174d81)By The Same Author (#u4af9f68f-ce03-59ea-978f-7f616d51cb0a)About the Publisher (#u837d9c8d-4dea-51ec-a870-d5891b7e5cd3)
Chapter One (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
‘Maggie Warren?’
I am not ready for this.
I was about to change my mind when the girl came to get me.
I smiled. Such a false smile, it nearly cracked my face.
She was a new girl; she must have started after the –
Since I’d been away. She was confident. Supremely so. More confident than I had ever been at her age. At her stage. She was young and blonde and she walked with a swish of paper-straight hair and an empty click of the long leather boots that promised – something, I wasn’t quite sure what. Exactly Charlie’s type.
‘I’m Daisy,’ she threw over an immaculate shoulder as I tried to keep up. I was already unsettled, and her swagger unnerved me more. Did she know something I didn’t? Painfully I followed her down corridors, trying to keep up, banging awkwardly through the doors, my crutches unwieldy beneath my arms. Waiting all the time for her to speak. She didn’t. I searched for something to say. I contemplated myself in her position, remembering all the inanities I’d spouted since I’d started, the yards and yards of crap I’d sparkled with. The punters have earned it, I always thought. In Daisy’s book, though, apparently, I hadn’t. But I was different, perhaps.
I needed to fill the silence – the silence aside from the click of her dominatrix boots. She awarded me a thin smile as she pulled open the next set of doors, as she waited for me, not quite tapping her toes, with a smile that said, ‘I am leading you like a lamb to your slaughter.’
I said, ‘Have you worked for Double-decker before?’
She shook her sleek head. ‘Came from the Beeb.’
I loathed people who said ‘the Beeb’.
‘Graduate trainee.’
Didn’t like them much either. The graduate trainee who invariably thought they knew it all. She was remarkably flat-chested for one of Charlie’s girls, I noted, as I squeezed past her.
‘Oxford, you know.’ Had she actually sniffed as she said it?
‘Ah, Oxford.’ I nodded sagely. That would explain it. Charlie had a penchant for posh.
Before I could struggle any further to be her ‘friend’, just like all those punters in the past had tried to be mine, we were there. Pull yourself together, Maggie, I told myself firmly. But my hands were actually shaking. It was so odd to be here on the other side. The green room was alive with people and light, the buzz and hum of adrenaline and apprehension. The buzz of attention, of being ‘the one’, the vital one. Everyone was bathed in the horrible neon light that yellowed the skin and made the eyes look dead. The banks of croissants and egg-and-cress sandwiches were already dry and curling; the orange juice was spilt in brilliant pools on the white linen. What was I doing here? Would they see inside me; know I’d sold my soul? I looked for Sally, then for the wine – but Charlie found me first.
‘Maggie, darling.’ The emphasis was on darling as he kissed me on both cheeks, his face lingering a little too long next to mine, his Ralph Lauren jumper tied in that silly knot over his breast-bone. His aftershave was as noxious as ever.
‘I could murder a drink.’ I was just a little too bright. I contemplated him for a moment. Then I leaned forward and asked, quietly, ‘You are sure about this, Charlie? I’m struggling a bit with my –’
He clasped my hand, a little too hard, his hooded eyes veiled. ‘Not going to back out now, are you, darling?’
I winced. It wasn’t a question.
‘Daisy, get Maggie a drink, would you? A wine.’
Kinky-boots smiled at him, tossing her hair becomingly, and fetched me a drink. Begrudgingly. She’d go far.
‘What?’ Now Charlie leaned in to catch my words, his hair-oil glinting in the light. Had I spoken aloud? ‘Don’t freak out on me, Maggie, please.’
‘I’m really nervous. This is very –’
‘Exciting? I knew you’d see it my way in the end.’
Did I have a choice? ‘I was going to say … I’m really not sure that –’
‘Don’t be silly.’ He looked impatient. ‘We’ve been through all this. It’s going to make the show.’
‘What is?’
He leaned forward so only I could hear. ‘And, of course, it’s your absolute last chance. Don’t fuck up. Again.’
‘But –’ I began, as Sally peered round the door. I was so glad to see her that I cried her name much too loudly. Her jolly broad face was uncharacteristically tense. She smiled back, but even her dimples were subdued. Stress was definitely winning the day.
‘Babe.’ Her eyes flicked round the room. ‘Daisy,’ she said as she found her target, gesturing frantically, ‘has the anti turned up yet?’
‘What anti?’ I frowned.
‘Oh, don’t worry. They’re not for you.’
I didn’t believe her. My job had lost its allure some time ago, from years of deceiving those we relied on to provide the entertainment. With a nasty lurch, I realised I was the entertainment now. Oh God. I shook my head.
‘Sal, I really don’t need a row on air, Charlie promised. He called it a – a “healing” show’. Who was I kidding?
I lost Sally’s attention as Renee swept into the room, pausing by the door for maximum effect. She knew exactly how to work it. There was a brief lull as heads turned, a visible wave of excitement over by the croissants. Renee didn’t always bother with the guests these days, but this was a big one. A real ratings winner, if it went right: this year’s greatest tragedy – just in time for BAFTA nominations. I shuddered. Sally was off again.
‘Sal,’ I hissed after her, ‘I’m not going to have a row with anyone. Really. Charlie did promise.’
A shadow flitted across Sally’s face. ‘Bear with me, all right, Maggie? Daisy, get the rostrum tape of the headlines into the gallery. Now, please.’ Then she was gone.
I downed my drink in one huge gulp. The headlines. That overwrought outpouring of horrified, voyeuristic – what? Delight? A glut of hysterical sympathy for our terrible misfortune on that coach. Blame, shame and sorrow. I’d managed to avoid most of them the first time. Only occasionally, when a nurse had forgotten to bin –
I skidded the memory to a necessary halt. My head was aching and I wanted a cigarette badly. I wanted to get the hell out of here even more. I must have been mad to agree to this, and right now I couldn’t quite remember why I had. I inched toward the door as surreptitiously as my bad leg would let me; then Daisy was by my side.
‘Okay?’ She smiled that horrible thin smile again.
‘I need a fag,’ I tried to smile back. Someone stopped Daisy to ask where they could change and that was it; I was off down the corridor as fast as my crutches would carry me. But I wasn’t going to make it outside in time so I veered off to the loo. Perhaps they wouldn’t look here (they always looked here – I was hardly the first guest to hide behind a locked door). The end cubicle was free. I stood against the door and fumbled for my cigarettes. My skeletons weren’t so much rattling the closet, they were smashing down the walls. My hands were trembling so much I dropped my lighter and cursed myself. Two women were discussing Renee over the divide between their cubicles. ‘Such pretty hair,’ one cooed. If only they knew. Normally I would have smiled, but right now I felt more like crying. Everything was out of kilter. Worst of all, I despised myself. I hadn’t realised quite how hard I was going to find this. Oh God. I didn’t know if I was more scared about being on the other side for the first time in my life, or of talking about – it. Digging up the past. Would they manage to mine my depths for secrets long untold? I inhaled deeply, reckoning I’d got about five more puffs before the smoke alarm went off. The women clattered out, tutting about passive smoking. My leg throbbed. Holding my fag between my teeth I searched my bag for yet more pills.
‘Maggie?’ The deep tones of Amanda, the floor manager. ‘You in here?’
Daisy had rallied the whole bloody troupe. I held my breath but then the smoke curled up into my eyes, up my nose, and I coughed.
‘Maggie? Is that you?’ The relief in Amanda’s voice was tangible. I held my breath.
‘Ten minutes, darling.’
It was useless. ‘Just coming,’ I whispered miserably.
‘I’ll wait for you.’
‘Great.’ I took a last deep drag and dropped the fag into the toilet-bowl, where it died with a tiny fizz. Wiping my sweating hands on my jeans, I opened the door, awkwardly leaning round on one crutch to come out.
‘Darling!’ Amanda hugged me, sniffing the air. ‘Smoking, you naughty girl? How are you, you poor old thing?’ I felt like her pet Labrador.
‘Oh, you know.’
‘Look, do you want to come through now? Take the weight off your poor foot. Is it very sore?’ She glanced down at my leg like it might snap. Like it might fall off. My crutch got caught on the sink, and I stumbled, just a little, wincing as Amanda grabbed my arm.
‘It’s okay,’ I said, and I heard my own voice ringing outside my own ears. ‘It’s just the wine.’
She frowned.
‘I’m not pissed.’ Actually, that wasn’t entirely true. I hadn’t eaten anything apart from painkillers since God knew when. ‘Don’t be silly. True professional, me. But I might just have a quick top-up before –’
Amanda took my arm, gliding me swiftly through the door toward the studio. She was like a little wiry foxhound; I was clenched between her teeth and she was not going to let me get away again. I debated bashing her over the head with a crutch and making a run for it. A stumble for it.
‘No time, darling.’ Her headset cackled. ‘In the break, maybe.’ She assessed me with speed. ‘You should have been to make-up.’
Daisy appeared in the corridor, checking her mobile with overwhelming indolence, and Amanda glared at her.
‘That phone should be off, young lady. You’re very pale, you know, Maggie.’
‘Pale and uninteresting,’ I joked. But nobody laughed. Anxiety set in again.
‘Amanda.’ This was the point of no return. I took a deep breath, pulled her to one side. ‘I’m really not sure – I really don’t think I can do this, actually.’
‘Course you can, darling. Gosh, if I had a pound for everyone who nearly changed their minds before we started, I’d be a millionaire! And they all come off loving it. All wanting more.’
‘This is me, Amanda, remember?’ I muttered. The old platitudes would not wash, of that I was quite sure. Pissed or not.
She had the grace to flush slightly. ‘Look, I’m going to get Kay up here with some blusher for you. And you,’ she poked Daisy with her clipboard, ‘get Maggie another drink for her nerves. Stick some wine in a water-bottle. Just don’t let any of the other guests see, for Christ’s sake.’
We were at the studio door. We were in the studio. It was so hot in here already. Sally had taken the floor now to do her bit. The audience was laughing at some feeble joke. They loved it, lapped it up. Charlie rushed in, rushed to my side. ‘All right, Mags?’ No one ever called me Mags, least of all Charlie. Unless …
‘Oh, you know,’ I grimaced. ‘Fine and dandy.’ I imagined slapping my thigh like a principal boy.
Charlie smiled, his teeth shining brilliantly white under the bright lights. ‘Just remember, darling, you’re going to get closure now. And that’s what you need.’
‘Closure,’ I repeated like a well-schooled parrot. ‘What I need.’
Headlines from the days after the accident suddenly flashed up on the studio monitors. My heart began to race as I was forced to read them. The Sun screamed ‘CRASH COACHCARNAGE’; the Express enquired politely ‘HORSES ON THEMOTORWAY: WHO IS TO BLAME?’; the Mail screeched ‘GOVERNMENT’S ROADS CAUSE TRAGEDY’.
I tore my eyes away just as Daisy arrived with the water-bottle. I took a huge swig. Now Kay was here in a fug of sweet scent and a cloud of powder that always made me think of my mother.
‘You all right, ducks?’ I loved Kay. I wished she was my mum.
‘Just a bit of blush to brighten you up, a dab of powder to stop the shine, okay? You can manage without mascara, you lucky girl.’
Pete the soundman rolled up to check my mike. He adjusted it slightly with his hairy little hands, taking pantomime care not to delve too deeply down my V-neck. He winked at me. ‘Funny to see you on this side. Break a leg.’ Then he backed into my plaster cast and went puce.
And now Renee arrived. She sauntered onto set like the true diva she was; and the audience went mad. They always did. They had no idea of the blood and sweat we poured out for Renee, of the tears (ours) and the tantrums (hers) and, and –
She held her hands up for quiet. Silence dropped like a blanket across the studio. Now Renee was talking. Oh, I knew exactly why she was so captivating. She drew them in – she was every man’s friend, every woman’s confidante, as she cast her bountiful eye upon them. Like flapping fish on a line she reeled them closer, until they were prone with ecstasy. She dropped her voice, inviting them to lean in, to share her world.
And in this trice, as I listened, as her words washed over me, I began to relax a little. I still felt the surge of adrenaline, but I could play Renee at her own game; I knew exactly how to do it. God knew I’d been in this business long enough. Once I was as naïve as our audience; a true innocent believing everything we revealed on television was for the greater good. Now I was hardened and desperate to escape this trap, so I’d done my deal with Charlie. I’d let Charlie use what he had on me, what happened before the accident, when my world had finally caved in, because I was still too weak to fight when he first came to me. I just didn’t know any more if it was the right decision to have made.
But this morning I did at least know what they wanted from me and I had to give it to them. For me, it was a one-time, only-time thing, to be on this side with my make-up done and my mike tucked down my top, under my blue armchair the drink no one in the audience knew was there. I took a final swig and pushed it back with my good foot. I took a deep breath, and remembered Charlie’s promise. I remembered Charlie’s threats. I just had to ensure I didn’t reveal too much. I thought of being on the running track at school and my dad shouting on the touchline, ‘Keep going, Maggie, keep on’, as I drove myself forward, and I was ready. Whatever Renee threw at me, I was ready.
Renee was delivering her final droplets of wisdom and waving her final fickle wave before she left the floor. Kay gave my hand a final squeeze and Charlie stood behind the curtain and sleeked back his thick and greying hair before giving me an obsequious thumbs-up. Amanda was counting us down, the titles were up on the monitors and the tension that is a live show was zinging in the air, as palpable as the sweat that had started to run down my back. And then Renee was back on the floor, waving, the audience cheering and clapping and whistling until she snapped on the gravitas this subject would take, and hush fell.
And it was then that I noticed the girl for the first time. She was sitting two chairs away from me, on the other side of the eminent trauma psychologist Sally had wheeled on. She was stunning. A cloud of dark hair framed a little heart face and she held her arm, her plaster-casted arm, gingerly in her other hand. As if she felt my stare, she turned and blinked and smiled at me, a smile that filled those big violet eyes, eyes like bottomless buckets of emotion, and I felt very odd. Like – what do they say? Like a ghost had walked over my grave.
Chapter Two (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
Fortunately for the show, Sally’s anti turned up just in time to go on air. Unfortunately for him, though. The poor man never had a hope in hell. He was just fodder, pure gladiatorial bait – thrown to the hungry audience who were ready for a mauling. Simeon Fernandez, his name was. He was some kind of new-age cognitive therapist wanting to expound his theories on post-traumatic stress being purely in the mind. More to the point, he had a new book to promote. And it was he who brought Fay and me together.
Renee gave Fernandez the floor very early. His fleshy face was flushed with self-importance as he waffled on a bit about this theory and that, Renee pacing lightly behind him, her deadly stance disguised in casual lilac batwings. Lilac mohair. I tried to concentrate, staring hard at Fernandez’s chins that wobbled as he spoke. I wondered if Renee’s jumper was as scratchy as it looked. My leg was really aching, and my little toe had just begun to itch inside the cast when my name resounded like a whip-crack round the studio.
My head snapped up; apparently Renee was introducing me. There was really no escape now as ‘Victim Maggie Warren’ bounced off the walls to the sympathy of those devils in the audience. I forced a smile (though I knew Charlie would have much preferred a sob) and then Renee was on me. She came right up and took the chair beside me, perching on the very edge so she could really get to me. I tried not to lean away. Our knees were actually touching and I could smell her cloying scent, so sweet and sickly that my stomach churned – or perhaps that was the booze. I realised too late I couldn’t back up in my seat without my crutch clattering loudly to the ground. I was stranded there; so near that I could count the open pores round her nose. She held my hand, and looked deep into my eyes. Her coloured contact lenses were unnaturally bright in the hideous studio light, and I stifled the urge to laugh hysterically.
‘Mr Fernandez has written a book on stress,’ Renee breathed at me, her Welsh lilt so soft and caring. ‘He thinks it’s in the mind, and we must fight to overcome it,’ – Mr Fernandez nodded smugly, his chins juddering like Sunday custard in a jug – ‘but, Maggie, you’re testament to the fact that a terrible accident can utterly change your life, aren’t you?’
Was I?
‘Am I?’
I blinked. The muscle in my cheek twitched with an influx of adrenaline.
Renee frowned. Her pancake cracked a little. Charlie coughed most unsubtly from the sidelines. Utter silence fell; the audience leaned forward as one. They waited. I waited. Renee covered my hand kindly (she hadn’t so much as shaken it in the past two years) with both of hers – and then I pulled it back quickly, suppressing an exclamation. I was sure she’d pinched me; just a tiny pinch, so tiny that no one else would know, but a pinch nevertheless. I absorbed Charlie’s scowl; remembered his words the other night. I breathed deeply. Auto-drive clicked on.
‘Sorry. Yes.’ How alien Renee’s eyes looked. Other-worldly. ‘Of course it did. Has. It’s turned everything on its head. I –’ I paused for what must have seemed like effect, searching desperately for something sensible to say. Anything to say. ‘I don’t think my life will ever be the same again.’
Renee sat up in triumph. I’d come up trumps. I slumped in my seat. God, it was hot in here. Fernandez immediately weighed in, uninvited, with how I should overcome my trauma. I was still a young woman, I mustn’t give in to my weaknesses. I must believe in positive thought.
‘Come on, Maggie. Stress is all in the mind, I promise you.’ He looked at the audience hopefully. I looked at him mournfully. I tapped my bad leg sadly. And then I wasn’t acting any longer; I was transported briefly into the heart of my own pain.
‘This, though, Mr Fernandez, my damaged leg, I mean, this isn’t in the mind – is it?’ A bubble of misery, like an astronaut’s helmet, sealed snug around my head. I must shake it off. Showing real emotion on live TV was not my intention. ‘I might never walk properly again,’ I murmured. ‘I used to run, you know.’
The audience went wild in their seats. They were sure of Mr Fernandez’s role now. He was the Wolf to my Red Riding Hood, the absolute villain on the floor, and they could rip into him as they’d been primed. I swallowed hard and milked it like I knew I must.
‘I can’t work. I need to have help at home,’ (sort of true) ‘I have nightmares.’ (Painfully true. I couldn’t continue on that tack.) I twisted the tissue that Renee had pressed into my hand; recovered myself just enough to go on. I cleared my throat.
‘I have a bad limp, I’ve had to have my foot put back in plaster again because –’
A little voice chimed in. ‘It’s changed my life utterly too.’
Renee turned to the voice, the epitome of eager concern. ‘Fay Carter, you too were on the coach that crashed that terrible night. Can you tell us exactly what happened? We can see Maggie is struggling to give us the painful facts.’
A matronly woman in the front row actually said ‘Ah.’ I smiled weakly, the last lot of painkillers finally kicking in. But Fay was only too glad to join the fray – like a sleek little greyhound tensed against the starting-gate, she was off. I slumped with relief. Surely I’d done enough?
I thought desperately of the drink tucked beneath my chair. I could see Amanda with her stopwatch. We must be nearing the break now, please God. I could feel myself beginning to sweat again as I flicked in and out of Fay’s words. The truth was – and how Renee would have loved this, should I have cared to share it with her – the truth was, the accident was too agonising to recall.
‘And I was travelling back to London to see my boyfriend, really excited, you know how it is when you haven’t seen them for a while.’ The audience ah-ed again. They loved a love story – though they definitely preferred a fistfight, given the choice.
‘I’d just walked up and down the coach to use the loo, too much tea, you know.’ She smiled up at the audience, the audience smiled fondly back. This girl knew how to work it. ‘I saw Maggie there when I passed, she was asleep.’ She turned her headlamp eyes on me. ‘Sleeping like a baby, you know.’
My skin prickled. I didn’t remember ever having seen this girl before. But I suppose I had been – absorbed. I looked down at my hands.
‘And I kind of knew then that she was my future.’
My head snapped up in horror. What?
‘Call it intuition, if you like. Then I heard this woman scream, and we swerved violently. We – the coach, well, it started to tip, straight away, to go right over, you know. And that – that was it, really.’ There was a tiny catch in her sweet voice. I looked down, my stomach rolling with the memory. My tissue was in tiny bits over my good knee.
‘The coach just, you know, flipped, onto its back, you see, right into the other lane, you know, right into the oncoming traffic. And it wasn’t till – till after that we knew three horses had got out of a field next to the motorway, somehow the fence had come down and they were on the road, poor things.’
The audience clucked with admiration at her benevolence. A little tear escaped from one thick-lashed eye and trickled slowly down her porcelain skin. ‘The coach-driver didn’t have a chance, poor man.’
Renee asked, very quietly, ‘Did he –’
Fay shook her head mournfully. ‘No. He didn’t make it.’
Renee clasped her hands together across that magnificent bosom. ‘Sadly Fay is quite right, ladies and gentlemen. Tragic Stan Quentin didn’t survive the horrific accident, along with eleven other poor souls that awful night. I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say’, big pause, sad smile, small dip of head, ‘each and every one of them is in our prayers.’
Frantic nodding from the audience. A few loud sniffs. Renee neatly changed angles for her close-up in Camera One.
‘But does every accident have to end in doom and gloom? Well, no, because as we are about to demonstrate, even accidents can bring folk closer together.’ Smooth camera change as One pulled out. ‘As these young ladies will bear testament to.’
I peered into the wings to see who was about to be brought in. ‘That’s right,’ Renee continued. ‘Fay has something to say to someone very special. Daisy!’ If Renee’s smile became any wider, her face would explode.
Daisy flounced on now, gurning at the cameras, holding an enormous bunch of flowers. Lilies. My heart started to beat faster. Slowly Daisy handed them to Fay, milking the time she was on-camera. But Fay would be upstaged by no one; she swept up the bouquet and stepped towards my chair. I glanced behind me again as Daisy finally admitted defeat and slunk off.
‘Maggie, I just want to say – you saved my life.’ I stared at the glistening trail of her tears. ‘I can never thank you enough.’
‘Maggie.’ Renee was beside me now, forcing me to stand. I dragged myself to my feet. ‘What do you want to say to Fay, babes?’
‘I’m really so – sorry,’ I stuttered. ‘But I don’t know what you –’
‘You saved me, Maggie. I was choking on my own blood …’ There was an enormous gasp of horror from the audience. Two over-made-up teenagers in the front row looked like they were going to be sick. That would be a first on live television.
‘And you reacted so quickly, you saved my life.’
Had I? Charlie had never mentioned this. ‘I’m sorry, I just don’t remember anything –’
Fay thrust the flowers at Renee and enveloped me in a huge hug as best she could with a plaster-casted arm, almost knocking me off my good foot. From behind the bouquet, Renee glowered at me. I’d obviously ruined the big moment. Bored of not being the centre of attention, she walked in front of us now as I tried to gently disentangle myself from a sobbing Fay. I wished fervently they’d take the lilies away. They reminded me of things I only wanted to forget.
‘Isn’t that marvellous, ladies and gents, doesn’t it just warm the heart? And so, while we leave these lovely ladies to reminisce,’ – about nearly dying? – ‘coming up in Part Three, the woman who wowed the scientists when she returned from the dead. Not only is she a walking miracle – she’s got a whole new face. Yes, Leonora Herbert is one of the very first successful face-transplant patients ever.’ Gasps all round. ‘But first, right after this break, we’ll meet the lady who says there’s light at the end of the tunnel – she knows because she met her partner through a bereavement group for trauma victims. Don’t go away, folks.’
She shoved the flowers at me; I put them behind my chair. We had exactly one and a half minutes to relax and breathe. I had one and a half minutes to drain my ‘water-bottle’. I did so with gusto, then looked hopefully around for Daisy. Charlie crossed to Renee, dropping his voice. I squinted at them, trying to lip-read. I heard the word ‘flat’ more than once.
Renee tossed her hair as Kay padded up with the powder-puff. Daisy brought Renee a drink that she snatched as rudely as I’d known she would. I tried to attract Daisy’s attention, but she was too busy making eyes at Charlie. I tried to attract his attention, but he was now being harangued by Renee. I couldn’t believe he’d let Fay do that to me without warning. Actually, no – I could believe it. Fay smiled at me over the eminent psychologist who hadn’t got much of a word in yet (too erudite and sensible, probably). A carrot-haired man who’d arrived in the break was being miked-up. I saw him check his watch and frown. Fay’s eyes were still drilling into me. I smiled back at her, more than a little uncomfortable. Perhaps she did look familiar …
Simeon Fernandez was beginning to bluster to anyone who’d listen. He’d obviously sensed he wasn’t there just to promote his great work. Sally had popped in from the gallery to appease him a bit. She patted my hand quickly as she passed. ‘Nearly there, Maggie. We just need a little more of the personal stuff if you can bear it. Then we’ll bring the copper in.’ She indicated Carrottop. He didn’t look like a policeman, I thought hazily. His suit was too untidy.
Renee smacked her lips together as Kay finished applying the gloss. She headed straight to Fay; she’d sensed she had a real ally sitting right there.
‘You’re fantastic, darling,’ she purred. ‘I’m going to push you a bit on how the accident has affected your relationships, etc. Okay?’ Without waiting for an answer, Renee generously extended her explanation to all now. One happy media family. ‘Then we can hear from Mr Fernandez again, and, of course, the wonderful Doctor Draper.’
Doctor Draper looked slightly mollified. He smoothed his lurid tie down over his portly belly. Did all men of science enjoy their food too much? I wondered vaguely. Fish and micro-chips. I grinned. Finally, Renee crossed to me.
‘And, Maggie,’ she dropped down to my level, dropping her voice accordingly, ‘get your head out of your arse, all right?’
I stopped grinning and flushed, feeling the stain burning my skin. Before I could retaliate, she was back with Kay for a final tweak. ‘And the set looks bloody drab, Amanda,’ Renee snapped. ‘Put those gorgeous lilies behind Maggie in the vase.’
I winced as Amanda complied wordlessly then rushed out onto the floor again. ‘Okay, guys. Thirty seconds and counting. Settle down, please, though do keep up the great energy. You’re a fantastic audience, aren’t they, Renee?’
Renee was centre-stage again, extending her scarlet talons before her to give the audience a little clap. The lilies stank. I shrank down in my chair.
‘Darlings,’ she dropped her voice subtly, then spread her arms wide to include each and every one of them, ‘I’m going to let you into a little secret, all right?’
Oh yes, it was more than all right. They actually craned forward. Infinitesimal pause. Wait, wait, wait …
‘You’re my best audience of the year so far. And’, they craned a little further, ‘it’s not far off Christmas – so what does that say?!’
They whooped with joy. They had no idea she said this every show. And if they did know, if they were old regulars, why would they care? They were Renee’s special audience, today, here and now – and that was all that mattered.
‘And we’re back in five, four, three, two –’ Amanda finished her count. The title music blared. Renee composed herself, flung on her tragedian robe so grandly.
Fernandez and Draper had a row. Charlie looked a little happier. Fay talked about how terrified her parents had been when they turned on the news and saw the accident before they’d heard from her. The plant in the audience tried to stir things up even more by asking me whether I thought trauma was to be expected if we all led such adventurous lives and didn’t just stay at home and mind the kids. I pointed out as coolly as I could that I didn’t have kids and travelling down the motorway to get home in a National Express coach because my car had broken down outside Bristol (they didn’t need to know the truth) hardly constituted adventure.
Then Renee started on the relationships. I licked my dry lips anxiously, but the wine was going a little way in protecting my poor aching heart. Only a little way, though. Fay, on the other hand, was basking in it all. Warhol’s ‘fifteen-minute fame game’ had truly taken hold; the fluffy rabbit of celebrity was tantalising the quivering greyhound.
‘You know,’ she blinked up at Renee, her voice all small and wounded again, ‘I’ve found it very hard with Troy since the accident.’
Troy!
‘Darling.’ Renee crossed the floor in a grand swirling gesture, the batwings flapping. Fay looked tiny beside her. ‘Can you share, babes? Can you tell us why?’
My good toes curled. Fay breathed deeply. Renee took her hand. ‘Just take a minute, please, Fay. There’s no rush.’
Charlie’s frantic checking of his watch belied her words. Fay breathed again.
‘Okay? Come on, then, tell Auntie Renee.’ Gently, she coaxed it out of her.
‘It’s just – well, he’s become incredibly – over-protective. He hardly wants to let me out of his sight, he’s so worried something else might happen.’
I shifted slightly in my seat. Renee’s radar picked up the minuscule movement. She dashed to the middle of the floor; was on me again before I knew it.
‘Maggie, have you got something to say? What about your partner? How has he dealt with your accident?’ Renee looked directly at me. She knew damn well about my partner; she must do. It would have been all around the office immediately. I met her eye.
‘I’m single at the moment, Renee.’ I forced a smile. ‘Like you.’
She smiled right back, her face a mask. Venom seeped out of the tiny lines round her eyes, out of her glossed mouth, down through the hair extensions bought for hundreds from her celebrity stylist, which had been traded for pennies by skinny East Europeans, and originated from starving Asian street-kids. But she kept right on smiling.
‘Do you have some advice for Fay, Maggie?’ Renee clamped her hand down on my shoulder.
‘Not really,’ I muttered.
Charlie coughed again, loudly this time. Renee’s acrylic nails indented my flesh. I sighed.
‘Right. Well, Fay, how do –’ I swivelled round in my seat to look directly at the girl, who smiled back in encouragement. ‘– how do you feel about Troy’s protectiveness?’
She considered the question gravely for a moment. ‘I don’t know really, Maggie.’
This was starting to feel like a bad edition of Oprah. I prayed fervently that no one I knew was watching.
‘But we are considering getting some counselling to get us through the bad patch.’
I was sure Troy would be overjoyed to hear her admitting this on national television.
‘I mean, I’ve read some stuff, you know, like from Relate or marriage guidance people, you know, and they say the best thing is not necessarily to stay together. I mean, if you have counselling, they won’t always advise that. If, you know, things aren’t right.’
‘No, well, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’d say that was pretty obvious. Any counsellor worth their salt would tell you that.’
She looked at me. ‘Would they?’ There was something incredibly intense about her expression. ‘Do you really think they would?’
‘I mean, like I said, I don’t want to offend you. But if you find him – stifling – why would you want to stay?’
‘I guess you’re right,’ she said, very slowly. ‘I just hadn’t thought about it like that. I thought he was just being, you know – nice.’
‘Well, I’m sure he is nice. But that doesn’t mean he’s doing the right thing, being over-protective. Some men are just like that, aren’t they? They like control.’ For the first time today I felt almost impassioned. Almost. ‘They want to know where their women are at every moment, whether –’
Renee was bearing down on me. She had absolutely no time for what she’d term ‘feminist claptrap’ on her show: too worthy, not enough blood and guts.
‘So, Maggie –’
I recognised that tone.
‘You’ve had to have some help yourself, eh, sweetheart?’
I couldn’t field it in time. The air crackled around me and my face froze. She knew. I stared at the floor in front of me as she paced before my chair. But what exactly did she know? Her leather boots were very high, as pointed as a cartoon witch’s.
‘You shouldn’t be ashamed, babes.’
Charlie had betrayed me: he must have done.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked, so terribly caring, they thought. ‘You look a little tearful.’
‘Oh no,’ I blurted. ‘Sorry. It’s just the flowers.’ I waved vaguely behind me. ‘Lilies. I – I don’t like – I get a weird reaction, you know.’ I would never tell the truth here. ‘Hayfever.’
‘Share your feelings with us, Maggie. Come on, don’t be shy.’ Her voice dropped to a singsong lilt; its cruelty wrapped up carefully in coruscating kindness. ‘Perhaps we can help you, eh, Maggie?’ She raised her eyes to the audience. Her audience.
The air felt electric now; it sizzled round my head. Everybody waited. I could sense Charlie on his haunches, as expectant as a gundog waiting to collect its kill. Panic began to build in me.
Fernandez was sick of being overlooked. He pulled his lip over yellow teeth and unwittingly dispelled the tension.
‘So this is exactly what I mean in my latest book, Shadows ina Modern World. Often we ignore situations that we are –’
Renee held up an imperious hand. He’d blown it. ‘Thank you, Mr Fernandez –’
‘Doctor Fernandez.’
‘Sorry, Doctor Fernandez,’ she spat each syllable out like a small piece of dirt, ‘but I think we really need to know a little more about how tragedy affects the everyday life of our guests. How exactly do you drag yourself out of bed in the morning if you’ve lost the love of your life? Please give a huge round of applause to someone who can tell us – let’s welcome Lesley Quentin, widow of Stan, the brave driver who gave his life so heroically that night.’
I didn’t think poor old Stan had had much of a chance to prove his heroism that night actually. Fay was staring at me with a beatific expression on her gorgeous little face. And it was starting to seriously unnerve me.
In the final break they walked the face-transplant lady on, and the freak-show finally finished me off. Heart pounding, I gestured frantically at Charlie. He was busy eyeing up Transplant Lady’s glamorous sister on the sidelines.
‘I’m really not feeling that great,’ I muttered. ‘It’s all been a bit of a shock.’ I tried to sound reproachful, but he was impervious. ‘Do you still need me?’
‘For God’s sake, Maggie. There’s only another fifteen minutes to go. You need to pull the bloody stops out, okay? The reunion was fantastic, don’t let it go flat.’
‘Please, Charlie. I – I really do feel a little bit – queasy.’
He frowned, stepped back quickly in his Gucci loafers, just in case… Then Fay beamed at him and I saw him drowning blissfully in her violet eyes. She wasn’t even his type.
‘Okay, Maggie. Go and take five in the green room.’ Baring his perfect teeth at Fay, he straightened his tie. ‘We’ll talk later.’
I grabbed my crutches and hauled myself out of there before he could change his mind. Funnily enough, Renee didn’t bother with a goodbye.
In the deserted green room I sloshed some more wine into a glass and downed it with a not-quite-steady hand. Then I poured myself a strong coffee and sat down to wait for Charlie. I wished I was anywhere but here. I thought desperately of Pendarlin, of the soft yellow light and the space and the clear, clean Cornish air. It calmed me a little.
After interminable adverts about loo freshener and nappies, a multi-coloured Renee tripped girlishly through her titles and the show was back on air. She was at her best now with poor faceless Leonora. When Fay reached over and held the poor woman’s hand, the audience actually moaned with joy.
‘Abso-bloody-lutely sickening.’ I snapped the television off with the remote.
‘I have to say I agree, mate.’
My coffee went hurtling across the horrible beige appliqué sofa.
‘Sorry.’ An East-End accent: the policeman. He was disentangling himself from the mike, fishing the lead out of his scruffy white shirt. ‘What a complete waste of time that was.’
I delved around for a napkin. ‘Didn’t you get your chance to shine?’
He grinned. ‘Got turfed off before I could make my mark. They ran out of time for me apparently. I’m relieved, to be honest.’
‘Oh?’ I made a pathetic attempt to wipe up the coffee with a soggy serviette.
‘Drummed in to do a bit of police PR, you know. Not really my cup of char. Give me a con over a celebrity any day. What shall I do with this, d’you think?’
‘Just shove it on the side.’ I gestured vaguely at the table of stale croissants.
‘You done this before then?’
His direct gaze never left me.
‘I – I work for them, normally. When I’m not, you know –’ I tapped my leg again. ‘Not injured.’
Did his grin fade just a little? ‘Oh right. I see.’
I wasn’t sure I did. Since I’d been off sick I felt more out of place here than I ever had before.
The policeman was switching his phone on, checking the time. ‘I’d better do one. Nice to meet you.’
I smiled a half-hearted smile. ‘Likewise.’
‘Hope your foot’s better soon.’
‘Thanks. And you go get ’em, tiger,’ I said, a little groggily.
This time he definitely did grin. Painkillers and booze were perhaps not the most sensible of partners, I reminded myself, as he dropped the mike onto a plate of egg and cress. And it was only as the door clattered behind him that I noticed the blond boy skulking in the shadows.
‘God! You frightened me,’ I said shakily as he stepped towards me, extending a long white hand from the sleeve of a tweed jacket. How long had he been there? My mind scrabbled like rodent claws on wood as I tried to remember what I’d just said. What I shouldn’t have said.
‘Sorry. I thought you’d seen me.’
Tentatively I took the proffered hand. It was curiously limp, the rather dirty nails over-long.
‘Maggie Warren? Don’t you remember me? We met in the summer.’
Chapter Three (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)
There were still quite a few things I didn’t remember about the summer, and more that I didn’t want to. It was a necessary blank that I’d apparently blocked as best I could.
Last summer I had teetered on a precipice, following my wrung-out heart, and I almost didn’t make it back. It scared me now to be confronted with someone I had no memory of.
I looked closer at him. He had a smooth, rather feminine face, a choirboy’s pallor, blond hair that fell over his eyes like a child’s, although he was dressed like he was fifty. He was swaying slightly. In fact, the whole room appeared to be swaying slightly. I really needed to go home now. I certainly didn’t need to be any more unsteady on my feet than I already was: I’d be rendered ‘Drunkin charge of a crutch’. I stifled a rather hysterical giggle. It was definitely time to leave.
The boy looked a little nonplussed. ‘Don’t you remember me? Joseph Blake. I did some research for you in May. There was a couple of us. University placement.’
‘Oh God, yes, of course.’ I clapped a dramatic hand to my clammy brow. ‘How stupid of me.’ I had absolutely no memory of him whatsoever – and it frightened me. ‘Joseph – Joe, is it?’
‘No. Just Joseph.’ He was scowling now. ‘You don’t remember, do you?’
‘I do, Joseph, honestly. I’ve just had a bit of a morning of it. An early start, you know, and this –’ I wobbled my crutch around, ‘this doesn’t help my brainpower. How …’ I tried to focus on him properly, ‘how are you?’
He relented, his smile lighting up his smooth round face. I relaxed a little.
‘I’m well, thanks. Oh, and thank you for the reference.’
What was he on about now? ‘You’re welcome,’ I murmured.
‘So, I’m back for a bit. Charlie gave me a job. Well, I’m on a trial anyway. A three-month trial.’
‘Great,’ I smiled back, trying to mask my insincerity. PleaseGod, get me out of here.
The door swung open and Charlie swaggered in, his arm round a crowing Renee. I was stuck between a rock and a hard bitch. Oh dear.
‘Fantastic, darling. Fantastic bloody show. Leonora was absolutely worth her weight in the proverbial, and Fay’s tears. God!’ Charlie caught sight of me attempting to dissolve into the sofa. ‘All right, Maggie, darling. Feeling better? I told you this show would help heal the wounds for good.’
By the time I remembered him again, the boy had gone.
An apologetic Sally wanted me to go for a quick drink with her, but by now I’d realised that if I didn’t sober up I’d be throwing up. I needed to eat and lie down; more importantly, I wanted to get away from Charlie – fast. I’d see them all soon, I promised Sally. I’d be back at work in a week or two (or more like four, if I could help it).
Out on the busy street, I breathed a sigh of relief and lit a cigarette. The lunchtime rush had begun on Grays Inn Road, and I perched on top of the imposing studio stairs to wait for my cab. November’s chill was truly in the air, and I huddled down into my coat, shivering despite its warmth. The skeletal leaves from the ornamental trees in the studio’s planters skittered round my feet. Chip wrappers cartwheeled in the gutter. A Number 45 crawled past, spewing noxious fumes out below an advert for Renee’s memoirs, her smug face resplendent on its bright red rear, as big as a potting shed. I shuddered. I watched a very old man pull his tartan shopping-trolley up the road, his head wrinkled and jutting like an ancient tortoise’s. With a great lurch, I thought of Gar. I’d neglected her since the accident.
My cab pulled up and beeped. Hauling myself to my feet at the top of the stairs, an arm snaked through mine suddenly, sending me off balance. Panic coursed through my veins as the concrete rushed up towards me. Just in time I righted myself.
‘I’m so glad I caught you.’
I looked round at the voice, struggling to regain my equilibrium. Fay Carter was gazing up at me. ‘Does your foot really hurt? I’ve had loads of problems with my arm. They have to keep re-setting it.’
‘Oh dear.’ I tried to disengage myself without causing offence. ‘No, I’m fine, really.’ But I moved too fast; my crutch went crashing down the bloody stairs. I bit my lip, swallowing my pain and irritation.
‘I’ll get it.’ She pattered after the crutch. ‘It’s nice to help each other, don’t you think?’
‘Yes, of course,’ I replied uneasily.
‘After all,’ Fay returned the crutch to my freezing hand, ‘I’m only returning the favour.’ Her huge eyes were so serious, too serious, as she looked up at me. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to thank you before today for saving me.’
‘Look, I’m sorry, but I really don’t think I did.’ I heard the screaming metal on the motorway again and blanched. ‘You must have me confused with –’
‘No, Maggie.’ She just kept staring. ‘It was you, it was definitely you. They told me after, the rescue-workers. They pointed you out. And now you’ve just helped me again, in there.’ She indicated the television studio. ‘So I really owe you now.’
‘You don’t, honestly.’ I hopped down the steps as fast as my leg would carry me. ‘I’d better – you know. The cab’s waiting. I’ll see you –’
A metallic car with darkened windows pulled up opposite the studios, sounding its imperious horn.
‘That’s me,’ Fay smiled dreamily. ‘I was going to say’, she tapped lightly down the stairs beside me, ‘we should get together sometime, don’t you think? Give me your number, yeah?’
My heart sank, but she rattled on, not seeming to notice my reticence. ‘A few of us were thinking of starting a survivors’ group. I’d love you to be part of it, Maggie. You’d be great. Really helpful.’
Fay was too near me now, right in my space, peering up into my face. Was the girl always this upbeat? I felt truly exhausted. How could I explain that the idea of being in any sort of group right now filled me full of dread, least of all one that would reminisce endlessly about that hideous night? The silver car hooted again. Fay waved a little pearl-tipped hand.
‘Coming!’ She turned back to me. ‘Look, here’s my number, yeah?’ Fishing around in the sequinned handbag that dangled from her own plaster-cast, she handed me a small shiny pink card.
Fay Carter, Entertainer Extraordinaire, it announced in black flowing script. A tiny big-bosomed figure high-kicked beneath the words.
‘I had them made up when I knew I was coming on the show. Good, aren’t they? Give me a call. Don’t be shy. You know,’ she clasped my freezing hand in her little one, the diamond on her ring finger biting into my flesh, ‘I’ve got the feeling this is the start of something. Something huge.’ Leaning up, she kissed me on both cheeks. ‘Do you know what I mean? And by the way, I’m so sorry about your boyfriend. Charlie told me.’
I just stood there and stared, speechless, as the small figure drifted across Grays Inn Road, weaving through taxis, beneath the admiring builders ant-like on Café Buena’s new scaffolding, earning a beep from an appreciative white-van man.
Across the road, Fay paused at the car door, turning to wave. I saw a spiky peroxide head lean across to help her with the door. ‘See you soon,’ she mouthed, before a removal van blocked my view. When I looked again, she was gone.
As my driver settled me into the back of his car, chattering about the traffic and the ever-expanding congestion zone, I tried to concentrate politely, but all the time he prattled I felt a gnawing sense of unease, a sense that grew and grew. Deep down I knew I hadn’t seen the last of my new friend.
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